My fiance and I have spent our last two weekends priming ceilings. It's hard work, but rewarding. Every night after a few hours' work, we fastidiously clean out the rollers and brushes, using more water than we'd like—and they're never up to par the next day. This was our practice until a friend stopped by today and let us in on a painter's secret.
To make the rollers and brushes last much, much longer (and save gallons of water in the meantime!), here's what our friend told us:
After you're done painting for the day, wrap the roller or paintbrush in a wet towel. Place it in a plastic bag or wrap it with plastic wrap, and then—here's the secret—put it in the fridge. The roller or brush will stay fresh until you're ready to paint again!
This will make the roller last quite a bit longer and keeps cleanup to a minimum. You'll spend less money on supplies, and use many fewer resources. Sounds like a green dream come true.
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• Good Question: Is Washing Out Your Paintbrushes Worth All That Water?
(Image: Flickr member karpacious, licensed under Creative Commons)
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This does work! And I worked on a crew doing custom finishes for a number of years.
I usually do all my own painting, but in our last house we had some volume ceilings in the family room that I couldn't do myself, so I hired someone. The best tip I got from them was about the rollers they used: lamb's wool rollers. You can't get them at Home Depot or places like that, usually only at a custom paint store like Benjamin Moore. One costs about $15.00, but mine lasted well over ten years and was used for numerous jobs before I had to replace it. That's certainly better in my book than disposables or two-use cheapo ones. I also have a gadget that screws onto a faucet that is specifically made for washing out rollers, it too works great, with less water use.
Another friend (a professional painter) taught me years ago to wrap a cleaned brushed in a strip of newspaper after washing. It keeps the brush from getting all splayed out as it dries. Ha, look at me with all the tips! They are all good, though, I swear!
I've used a similar method except I used tinfoil (trying to use as little plastic as possible) and put the rollers/paintbrushes in the freezer.
Saran wrap. Don't need the fridge. It keeps for many days.
Same for brushes.
I use papertowels or saran wrap over brushes and rollers. Then place in the freezer. I think the freezer helps keep it fresh longer, say if you need to take a 5 day break from painting. Then just give it 20-30 min to thaw before painting. It works really well for keeping brushes nice! The brissels stay nice and don't dry out.
agree with johnnyro... the point is to keep air from drying out the paint. plastic wrap is all you need.